Book Summary and Reviews of Consequences by Penelope Lively

Consequences by Penelope Lively

Consequences

by Penelope Lively

  • Critics' Consensus (0):
  • Published:
  • May 2007, 272 pages
  • Rate this book

About this book

Book Summary

A chance meeting in St. James’s Park begins young Lorna and Matt’s intense relationship. Wholly in love, they leave London for a cottage in a rural Somerset village. Their intimate life together—Matt’s woodcarving, Lorna’s self-discovery, their new baby, Molly—is shattered with the arrival of World War II. In 1960s London, Molly happens upon a forgotten newspaper—a seemingly small moment that leads to her first job and, eventually, a pregnancy by a wealthy man who wants to marry her but whom she does not love. Thirty years later, Ruth, who has always considered her existence a peculiar accident, questions her own marriage and begins a journey that takes her back to 1941—and a redefinition of herself and of love.

Membership Advantages
  • Reviews
  • "Beyond the Book" articles
  • Free books to read and review (US only)
  • Find books by time period, setting & theme
  • Read-alike suggestions by book and author
  • Book club discussions
  • and much more!
  • Just $60 for 12 months or $20 for 3 months.
  • More about membership!

Reviews

Media Reviews

"[Lively] has crafted a fine novel: intricate, heartbreaking and redemptive." - PW.

"Starred Review. British writer Lively is a superb stylist inspired by a curiosity about history that only empathy and the imagination can illuminate." - Booklist.

This information about Consequences was first featured in "The BookBrowse Review" - BookBrowse's membership magazine, and in our weekly "Publishing This Week" newsletter. Publication information is for the USA, and (unless stated otherwise) represents the first print edition. The reviews are necessarily limited to those that were available to us ahead of publication. If you are the publisher or author and feel that they do not properly reflect the range of media opinion now available, send us a message with the mainstream reviews that you would like to see added.

Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.

Reader Reviews

Click here and be the first to review this book!

Membership Advantages
  • Reviews
  • "Beyond the Book" articles
  • Free books to read and review (US only)
  • Find books by time period, setting & theme
  • Read-alike suggestions by book and author
  • Book club discussions
  • and much more!
  • Just $60 for 12 months or $20 for 3 months.
  • More about membership!

Author Information

Penelope Lively Author Biography

Penelope Lively was born in Cairo, Egypt and spent her childhood there. She came to England at the age of twelve, in 1945, and went to boarding school in Sussex. She subsequently read Modern History at St. Anne's College, Oxford. In 1957 she married Jack Lively (who died in 1998). They had two children, Josephine and Adam. Jack Lively's academic career took the family from Swansea to Sussex and Oxford, and eventually to Warwick University, where he was Professor of Politics.

Lively received the Booker Prize for her novel Moon Tiger and wide acclaim for The Photograph and How It All Began. Lively is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature and a member of PEN and the Society of Authors. In recognition of her contributions to British literature, she has been appointed Dame Commander ...

... Full Biography
Link to Penelope Lively's Website

Other books by Penelope Lively at BookBrowse

6 more...

Membership Advantages
  • Reviews
  • "Beyond the Book" articles
  • Free books to read and review (US only)
  • Find books by time period, setting & theme
  • Read-alike suggestions by book and author
  • Book club discussions
  • and much more!
  • Just $60 for 12 months or $20 for 3 months.
  • More about membership!

Read-Alikes

Read-Alikes Full readalike results are for members only

If you liked Consequences, try these:

  • The Death-Defying Pepper Roux jacket

    The Death-Defying Pepper Roux

    by Geraldine McCaughrean

    Published 2012

    About this book

    Pepper's fourteenth birthday is a momentous one.
    It's the day he's supposed to die.
    Everyone seems resigned to it—even Pepper, although he would much prefer to live. But can you sidestep Fate? Jump sideways into a different life?

  • The Penderwicks jacket

    The Penderwicks

    by Jeanne Birdsall

    Published 2007

    About this book

    Deliciously nostalgic and quaintly witty, this is a story as breezy and carefree as a summer day. 2005 National Book Award Winner. Ages 8-12.

  • Ida B jacket

    Ida B

    by Katherine Hannigan

    Published 2007

    About this book

    'This insightful, seemingly intuitive first novel digs deep inside the soul of 9-year-old narrator Ida B Applewood....Hannigan shows a remarkable understanding of a stubborn child's perspective in her honest, poignant portrayal of loss and rebirth. Ages 9-up.'

We have 5 read-alikes for Consequences, but non-members are limited to three results. Join free to see the complete list of recommendations.
Search read-alikes
How we choose read-alikes
Membership Advantages
  • Reviews
  • "Beyond the Book" articles
  • Free books to read and review (US only)
  • Find books by time period, setting & theme
  • Read-alike suggestions by book and author
  • Book club discussions
  • and much more!
  • Just $60 for 12 months or $20 for 3 months.
  • More about membership!

BookBrowse Book Club

Book Jacket
When No One Else Will
by Amanda Skenandore
1940s Chicago nurse risks everything at an illegal women’s clinic during a high-profile trial of courage and sisterhood.

Members Recommend

  • Book Jacket
    The Jellyfish Problem
    by Tessa Yang
    A marine biologist rescues a Maine island menaced by a giant glowing jellyfish in this inventive debut.
  • Book Jacket
    Dangerous, Dirty, Violent, and Young
    by Zayd Ayers Dohrn
    Son of Weather Underground radicals recounts life on the run and decades of revolutionary struggle.
  • Book Jacket
    Look What You Made Me Do
    by John Lanchester
    A propulsive tale of intergenerational tension and revenge from the Booker Prize nominee.
Who Said...

Chance favors only the prepared mind

Click Here to find out who said this, as well as discovering other famous literary quotes!

Book
Trivia
  • Book Trivia

    Can you name the title?

    Test your book knowledge with our daily trivia challenge!

Wordplay

Solve this clue:

Q S, S

and be entered to win..

Your guide toexceptional          books

BookBrowse seeks out and recommends the best in contemporary fiction and nonfiction—books that not only engage and entertain but also deepen our understanding of ourselves and the world around us.